The Orissa government on Monday assured that all support will be provided to the South Korean steel company, Posco-India, to set up its 12 million tonne steel project in the state.
The state chief secretary, Ajit Kumar Tripathy, who reviewed the progress of the mega project on Monday, said that the government is taking steps to obtain the forest clearance from the Centre. Out of the total 4004 acres, 2958 acres forest land. After the Supreme Court gave its clearance for the diversion of the forest land, the statutory forest clearance is required from the ministry of forest and environment. He also said that the state government is taking steps for providing the raw material linkages to the project.
The review meeting also opined that the present global financial crisis will have no impact on the project, which is billed as the biggest FDI in the country. POSCO-India is proposing to invest 12 billion US dollar (approximately Rs 51,000 crore) in the steel project which includes a captive port and captive mines.
The state government, meanwhile, has completed the hearing on the Khandadhar iron ore mines. There were 227 applications from 216 companies and individuals including the ESSAR Steel, Kudremukh Iorn Ore Corporation Ltd. (KIOCL) for the mines. Out of this, the government heard 172 companies while 44 did not appeared for the hearing. Spread over 6204.32 hectares Khandadhar mines promises 250 million tones of iron ore.
The state government had recommended the Centre for grant of prospecting license (PL) to POSCO-India stating that the company?s proposal for maximum value addition would be for the best interest of the state. The Centre, however, directed the state government to hear all the applications received for the mines before recommending Posco-India for the prospecting licence.